1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to information retrieval, and more particularly to adaptively changing the font size with which information retrieved over a network is displayed.
2. Description of Related Art
Typically, text contained within documents made available to users of Networks such as the World Wide Web (WWW) is rendered on the user's screen using a font size that is explicitly embedded in a document or a corresponding style sheet. This results in cases where the text displayed may be too large or small for a particular user with a specific screen size. The developers of browsers are aware of this fact and have provided mechanisms that allow the user to increase or decrease the size of the font, either by clicking a button (often repeatedly), to change the font size in a relative manner, or by enabling the user to enter a specific font size. While these solutions may be satisfactory for viewing a single WWW page or group of pages, they require the user to repeatedly change the font size during a web-surfing session where many different pages having many different font sizes are displayed. Thus, these solutions are primitive in that the user interface is not adapting to the individual user's preferences or requirements.
Adaptive User Interfaces (UIs) are known. Many word processing, spreadsheet and drawing programs (e.g., Microsoft Word) "remember" the last X number of files opened and present them in most-recent-first fashion on the File menu of the application. This enables the user to quickly access the document desired without having to use the more complicated and time-consuming Open File dialog box.
Storing font size preferences within a document is known. Additionally, some products are engineered in such a way that they can recall the user's last display size preference. The user can set a value to indicate what percent of the printable size should be displayed. After exiting the program and then re-opening the document the display size selected earlier is retained. For example, if the user decides to view a document at 150% of its printable size, then closes the document, exits the program and later re-opens the document it will display, by default, at 150%.